If you were an adult in the 80's

[Gr33ngr33ngr4ss]

What was your typical dinner party / restaurant menu?

Im thinking
Prawn cocktail / melon
Coq au vin with duchesse potatoes & peas
Pavlova?
With a glass of orange juice on the table before the starter.

Bottle of grand cru champagne to start
Pâté?
Some sort of meaty casserole, or monkfish
Cheese platter
Dessert - cheesecake, French frangipane tart with pear, apple or apricot
Generally liqueurs with coffee

The crispy noodles came with the chow mein.
You can still buy the vesta meals

I too would say this was the 70s rather than the 80s

So I think it's clear it depends if you were in London or moved in fashionable circles! We definitely didn't. 😂

Late eighties the trendy dessert IME was prune and armagnac tart. It was absolutely everywhere. In fact prune and armagnac anything- I remember making prune and armagnac truffles to have with coffee after dinner.

We liked Beefeater a lot.
I think that was the standard eating out experience as a family.

The mixed grill was great. I see it's still going

www.beefeater.co.uk/en-gb/main-menu/beefeater_main_menu_priceless.pdf

That's absolutely not going on my menu! 🤣 prunes are revolting. Can I just have the armagnac?

I was working in advertising and entertaining clients a lot. Loads of sophisticated food and gallons of excellent wine. Other mood enhancing substances were freely available to whose whose tastes went that way. God it was fun.

Not necessarily 80s but always a basic of proper meals

Birds trifle
We still get it and birds instant custard. Having been brought up on it proper custard just isn't the same.

Steak Diane.

chicken chasseur

I agree. We’re not meant to say it because miners, poll tax etc but god, the 80s were a ride.

My genius life hack - push the thin end of a teaspoon into each one to make "lollipops" if you, like me, sadly no longer have corn on the corb forks.

Me too! (Apart from the mood-enhancing substances!)

I think those items were more 1970's. I remember things being more lasagna, moussaka, chili, veg curry garlic bread etc

I remember there being a bit of a Sloane Ranger/Laura Ashley thing going on, so when I had friends round I made beef wellington and duck a l'orange, and probably dressed a bit like Lady Di. I would have only been in my early twenties then. After that my circumstances changed and I moved to live in shared houses I ate a lot of bagels and spaghetti and pesto.

I was a student in the 70’s and the prawn cocktail/steak/Black Forest gateau was already a bit passé by then, so I’d say it would be very early 70’s. By mid seventies and early 80’s we were all experimenting with Indian and other ethnic food. The first dinner party I had in the 80’s was smoked salmon parcels, venison and walnut casserole - cooked in port, celeriac mash and lemon tart.

Depends where you were eating. Nouvelle cuisine was on the go and franchises were becoming common. Goats cheese tart was a good starter and more varied mushrooms like trompette and ceps were being used. Portions were going smaller. Pesto was being used more but creamy sauces like Diane less so. Depends where you were eating. I was trying out different places but did waste some money. Italian and Chinese were the usual. We hadn't got to Locatelli type Italian and no fusion cuisine or Nobu.

I asked DH what he had when "romancing" the previous Mrs Dick I was still at skool
Starter would be soup, melon or prawn cocktail.
Main would be steak, chicken chasseur or coq au vin.
Pudding would be knickerbocker glory (in the tall glass), creme caramel or sticky toffee pudding served with custard.

I was a very creative cook for the 1980s (not so much now) and for a 'dinner party' would use my own completely made up dishes based on my memories of travels as a child.

Usually I'd prepare the day before and relied heavily on 'marinades' - so one beef, hotter spiced dish and a chicken 'teriyaki'-inspired dish so sweet with tart flavours but not a gloopy sweet and sour. Both had veg in, the chicken usually with some fruit in for the sweetness. I used a lot of fresh coriander and dried herbs/spices - even in Sunderland c1980 there was an Health Food Shop to buy these.

And Leeks in Ginger, Orange and Tomato, a Sophie Grigson recipe I cut out from the London Evening Standard and the only recipe I've ever followed preciseIy. And a really wierd rice dish that included glace cherries fgs.....but all together it did actually work.

I did finish with a cheese board and grapes though.

For dinner parties, my mother used to make chicken simla (a cream-laden number sprinkled with almonds) served with boiled new potatoes or rice. Or chicken cobbler or boeuf bourguignon. Starter was melon. For pudding she would make baked Alaska.

We weren’t terribly posh, though.

Wasn't the 80s the start of Chilean sea bass, monkfish. Pierre Koffman in London was doing pigs trotter as a signature dish. Raymond Blanc was doing lighter French cuisine and Ken Hom and Prue Leith had cookbooks out

In the 70s me and my school friends had wannabee dinner parties which included aspirational recipes like roulades and 'Spanish' chicken. In the 80s I got my first Madhur Jaffrey Indian cookery book so it was homemade naans and various chicken dishes. By the late 80s we were cooking big DPs for friends with lighter meals - I remember fresh mackerel poached in Earl Grey tea! When my (grown up) kids cook for me now it's all Korean/vegan/fusion and absolutely delicious, but I have no idea what's going on. This thread has made me realize my culinary repertoire is firmly rooted in the 80s and 90s.

I agree about profiteroles, @AdaColeman . That or cheesecake.

Prawn cocktail was still a popular starter. Also soup, dressed avocado, pate, or smoked salmon blinis.

Main courses: Pork Stroganoff, lasagne, chilli and rice, chicken wrapped in bacon with a tomato sauce. Ratatouille. Veggie lasagne.

I used to work in a restaurant.